Book ~ "Cross the Line" (2012) Jack Patterson

From Goodreads ~ When veteran NFL quarterback Noah Larson finally guides his team to the Super Bowl, his dreams -- and life -- are dashed when his six-year-old son is kidnapped for a unique ransom: lose the game or his son dies. 

Seattle sportswriter, Cal Murphy, and photographer, Kelly Mendoza, get pulled into an FBI sting to help rescue Noah's son in Mexico. But when everything falls apart, Cal and Kelly are left to save themselves, save Noah's son, and save the Super Bowl.

 Super Bowl Sunday is approaching and as quarterback for one of the teams in the game, Noah Larson is extremely excited.  He has achieved his dream ... plus he has a wife and son whom he loves.  One last game, he promises his wife and then he'll retire on a high.  But those dreams are shattered when he gets a call that his son, Jake, has been kidnapped.  Throw the game or his son dies.

Sportswriter, Cal Murphy, stumbles upon the story and knows he's got to do what he can to rescue Jake.  He asks his photographer friend, Kelly Mendoza, to go undercover with him to head to Mexico to do a bogus story about a coffee maker who they suspect has kidnapped Jake.  It should be a piece of cake since they have FBI protection, right?  Well, things don't go as planned and it turns deadly.

This is the first book I've read by this author and I really enjoyed it.

I liked the writing style. It was well-paced and kept me wanting to read more.  The chapters were short snappy, which I like.  I liked the characters and think the author did a good job with them ... I could feel Noah's pain that his son has been kidnapped and that he's going to have to let his team down.  But his son means everything to him.

I'm not a football fan and this book would appeal to fans and non-fans.  There were football references but not too detailed ... it was fairly high level and I knew what was going on.  The main focus of this book is the mystery.

This is the second in the Cal Murphy series but you don't need to read the first one to jump right into this one ... it works very well as a stand alone (there are vague references to the first book).   I would like to go back and read the first one because I enjoyed this one so much.